The sun stood low in the sky, though it was noon. Athens rang with the sounds of hammers and saws, the music of regeneration and life flooding back in. Barely three weeks had passed since the last Persian soldier had left to march into the north, but the city had already lost the stunned calm of a funeral pyre.

From the height of the Pnyx hill, Themistocles could see entire new streets under construction. It was astonishing what a people bent to a single task could accomplish. The kilns in the pottery district had been the first things repaired. The enemy had left many of them intact or simply kicked apart. Those glazed bricks had been reassembled by hand. It hadn’t been long before they were back up to firing heat, running night and day, turning out tiles before the winter rains came. New roofs began to appear by the hundred, raised on fresh-cut beams and planking. All the carpenters knew green wood would warp and twist, but that was a problem for another month. Once they had put new handles on axe heads and saws, teams had gone out into the hills, cutting down firs, poplars, oaks, anything they could find. The results brought a smell of sap and sawdust overlaid on the sour reek of char. It was the smell of industry – and hope.

The Assembly had gathered up on the Pnyx to hear the latest reports – a daily event during the period of emergency. Themistocles found it oddly comforting to traipse up the hill each noon, to sit quietly and listen to merchants from the port, or the mine master in from Laurium, come to beg for more men. That last was perhaps the most important. They had the people of Athens, even the raw materials to rebuild a city. What they lacked was silver to pay them and food for them to buy. It had not been lost on Themistocles that Xanthippus had freed thousands of slaves. Perhaps that oath had helped to win the battle; Themistocles could not judge every small contribution. Nor could he gainsay Xanthippus’ authority to make such an offer. In that moment, in the middle of the evacuation, Xanthippus had been the Assembly, a tyrant in all but title. If it had been a plague, say, or a great storm, Themistocles might have considered calling an emergency meeting to debate the decision. As things stood, they were still at war – and he did not think ten thousand slaves would return to their previous owners without a struggle no one could win. Themistocles frowned, gripping the bridge of his nose between two fingers. He had brought Xanthippus home for exactly that sort of decision under pressure. It was done.